Space Economy
Orbit as an industrial buildout: launch costs down an order of magnitude, broadband and direct-to-device constellations, Earth observation, lunar programs, and a defense budget pivoting toward resilient space architectures and missile defense. No S&P 500 pure play exists, so the S&P leg is primes with major space segments — diluted by design; the pure plays across launch, constellations and in-space infrastructure live in the FW 3000 version. High-beta and long-duration: the basket is a read on risk appetite for the theme as much as on the theme itself.
Performance
Follow the theme against the wider market.
Series before each basket's creation date are a backtest of the membership as of creation; live tracking starts at creation.
| Return | 1 day | 5 days | 20 days | 60 days | MTD | YTD | 1 year |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Basket | -0.6% | -3.5% | -8.9% | +1.7% | -2.9% | +0.0% | +2.9% |
| vs S&P 500 | -0.3% | -3.7% | -8.6% | -4.3% | -3.4% | -11.6% | -13.9% |
Inside the basket · 7 stocks
Current members and the reasoning behind each inclusion. Returns are for individual stocks.
| Why it’s included | Added | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| LDOS | NASA services prime plus Dynetics space and hypersonics hardware | +0.5% | -5.4% | -3.3% | -25.8% | 2026-07-21 |
| BA | Defense & space prime: satellites, Starliner, SLS core stage and half of ULA | +0.8% | +1.2% | -9.5% | -2.2% | 2026-07-21 |
| NOC | Space Systems: satellites, solid boosters, Cygnus resupply and classified constellations | -2.5% | -5.2% | -9.5% | -8.6% | 2026-07-21 |
| RTX | Missile-warning and space sensor payloads; Blue Canyon smallsats — the diluted sensor leg | -0.7% | -5.2% | -9.7% | +10.7% | 2026-07-21 |
| LMT | Space segment prime: Orion, GPS III, missile-warning birds and the other half of ULA | -1.4% | -6.3% | -10.1% | +10.6% | 2026-07-21 |
| LHX | Aerojet Rocketdyne propulsion (RL10, RS-25) plus responsive-space payloads | -1.7% | -2.0% | -10.1% | -11.6% | 2026-07-21 |
| TDY | Space-qualified imaging and detectors (Teledyne e2v — Webb's sensors) for EO and science payloads | +0.5% | -1.8% | -11.7% | +19.6% | 2026-07-21 |
How this basket is built
Equal-weighted, monthly-rebalanced, buy-and-hold between rebalances; dated membership changes take effect same-day.
Tracked since 2026-07-21. Membership decisions are documented below.
Read the methodology →Reading the returns
Basket returns include dividends. “vs S&P 500” compares the basket’s compounded growth with the benchmark’s. Green means positive; red means negative.
Cross-checked against UFO. Daily return correlation: 0.62 across 1678 sessions. the listed pure-play space fund; global constituents (Eutelsat, MDA, iQPS) vs our US-only universes, and none of our prime-segment exposure
Membership history & changes
- create
Initial composition: 22 names. S&P 500 leg is primes with major space segments (BA, LMT, NOC, LHX, RTX, TDY, LDOS) — diluted by design, since no S&P 500 pure play exists. FW 3000 leg is the pure plays: launch (RKLB, FLY), constellations and satcom (ASTS, IRDM, GSAT, VSAT, SATS), Earth observation (PL, BKSY, SPIR), lunar and in-space infrastructure (LUNR, RDW, VOYG), components (KRMN) and ground software (KTOS). Reference pinned to UFO. Considered and excluded: AMZN (Kuiper is a top-3 constellation buildout but immaterial to the equity), GD (ground segment only), MOG-A (space is a minority of a mostly-aircraft business), HWM and GE (engines, not space), SPCE (below the FW 3000 cap cutoff), DXYZ (closed-end fund wrapper on private SpaceX shares, not an operating company). SpaceX, Blue Origin and Sierra Space are private — the theme's biggest actors are unlisted, which is exactly why the listed pure plays carry scarcity premiums.